


Not With Words

by engrebby



Category: Sleepy Hollow (TV)
Genre: F/M, POV Alternating, Pre-Relationship, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-10
Updated: 2013-10-23
Packaged: 2017-12-29 00:31:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/998724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/engrebby/pseuds/engrebby
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Abbie is a woman of few words, Ichabod is a man of many. Nonetheless, they are masters at concealing themselves by what they don't say, as well as reading others who do the same.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Miss Mills' Tells

Ichabod was a fast learner. Not only in part to his eidetic memory, though he would give full credit if anyone deigned to inquire.  The source of his quick adaptation to this world rested solely in the hands of his companion.  What made it easy where some might find it difficult was that his de facto teacher to this modern world was herself a fascinating subject.  As a member of the law, as well as a woman trying to move beyond her past, Miss Mills had built a wall around herself. The intonation of her voice, soft and at times impish in unguarded moments, would immediately take a hard edge with a heavy staccato that commanded attention to every word.  It was a trick, he found, that she had only mastered with her voice. It was her eyes that generally held her true emotions.  A gambling man would take full advantage of such tells, and Ichabod knew his way around a faro table.  It was through her eyes that he quickly learned that she could read others as well as he could.  
  
Though he had been warned by others that the Lieutenant was not one for words, that she grew impatient by innocuous queries, Abbie took sympathy that Ichabod knew absolutely nothing in this world.  When he was first delivered to the motel room that would be his hopefully temporary place of residence, she allowed him to open the door for her.  That earned him his first genuine smile from her as a result, as he found himself bemused by the slot above the doorknob. Surely one still needed a key to unlock doors, right? She was trying to mask a laugh at his expense, but it was absent the mockery of her peers.  
  
His query did not get a chance to be raised aloud, as the Lieutenant held up the plastic card that the man at the check in desk handed her.  One side had been littered with advertisements; he had dismissed the exchange as gratis for renting the room.  She took the card and, after waiting to make sure that Ichabod followed her actions, inserted the card advertisements-side up into the slot.  Pulling it out once, a latching sound could be heard on the door, and she turned the knob.  Instead of opening the door and escorting him through, she stepped back from the door and handed the card to him.  The smile returned again, as she nodded at him to open the door for himself.  He expressed thanks before doing so, and the closed in expression she gave warned him not to do it again.  Those were battles he was going to have to pick in the future, he gathered.  
  
She was speaking now, in that authoritarian voice as she gave him a quick tour, though her eyes were not on him as she ambled in the room.  As she maneuvered around the room, she scratched quickly on a small square pad of paper with a thick writing device.  Also made of what appeared to be made of plastic. How much of this world was made of plastic? Ichabod was almost afraid to ask.  She began to pull the notes off of the pad and would slap it onto objects around the room.  Miraculously, they would stay where she placed them.  When he experimented on one of the notes himself, not even bothering to read what was on them, she breezed by him to snatch it from his hand.  
  
“It will lose its adhesive,” she explained, her voice softening a hair as she pressed the note against his wool jacket. Sure enough, it floated down to the floor.  Grinning up at him, she rewrote the message and pressed it at the base of his side lamp.  Looking around him, he found the room littered with the square notes.  “There are clothes in the duffel bag, the bath is right in that door way, and I’ll see you tomorrow.”  
  
“Thank you, Miss Mills.” This time, he wasn’t thanking her for the quick instruction on the plastic key or the notes that stick, but for saving him from the asylum and for providing him with a place to rest.  He was thankful that she believed him, though apparent that doubts still lingered in her mind. Ultimately, he was grateful that she decided not to run away from Sleepy Hollow, leaving him alone to grapple with this uncertain reality on his own.  She was not ready to accept it as her fate just yet, but he believed her that instinctively she knew she needed to be here.  For that, he would thank her many times over.  Though he had to say it, at least once.  
  
After a brief, steady look into his eyes, the smirk Abbie gave him was one with acceptance.  “Good night, Crane.”


	2. What They See

To the world’s credit, they see Abbie precisely the way she wants them to—serious, unaffected, a calm before a storm with a force to reckon with.  No one should mess with her, and only the foolish would.  Yet, there were those that seemed to get past the façade to truly see her.  It unnerved her when she would see that look in those people’s eyes, that familiarity that made her nerves raw and left uncertain of how to respond.  Corbin was the first, his knowing gaze filled with paternal warmth and sternness.  He was quick to call her on her false confidence and impulsive decisions, but always in a way that didn’t undermine her intelligence.  If she was doing wrong, she was smart enough to figure it out herself.  There were moments where Abbie wished he’d just tell her what to do, but Corbin thought she was smarter than that.  Frustratingly, she had yet to prove him wrong.  
  
Wendy, the SHPD’s key receptionist, had Abbie pegged the instant that they met, pulling the then new recruit into an unsolicited hug while giving a tour of the office.  The hug was only halfway returned on Abbie’s part, though the woman’s infectious giggle was completely shared.  No one else saw the moment, but for the briefest of seconds Abbie allowed herself to feel overwhelmed by her new position. “You’ll do great,” the woman insisted quietly before ushering Abbie back to Corbin’s office.  The moment did not lead to them being the best of friends, but they had each other’s back over the years.  Even so, Wendy seemed to be the finest barometer to Abbie’s moods; it didn’t matter if Abbie gave the receptionist the same greeting with the same inflection at the start of every shift, Wendy would always follow it up with a matronly comment or a question on how Abbie was feeling.    
  
She did not expect Luke to see her; he seemed like another cocky deputy, another jock reminiscent of the ones who plagued her in high school.  He was interested enough and she lonely enough, so going out with him worked.  Abbie was not blind, she was fully aware that he was not the only man on the force with interest; Andy was enamored with the idea of Abbie Mills yet seemed to be okay with being her friend.  Luke Morales, on the other hand, just seemed like the type who would not remain interested for long.  It took him longer than the others, but after a few weeks of dating, he began to see her.  From then on, it became a battle.  He wanted to protect her, convinced to all and sundry that only he could save her from herself and the world.  As if all of her capability was lessened by his knowledge of her fear.  Hair would rise on her neck every time his voice would drop, just so, as if his typical brashness would cause her to crumple into little pieces.  She began to resent his machismo, the more ‘serious’ he got with their relationship, the more she was reminded why she felt as if she needed to get away from Sleepy Hollow.  The growing dread that something was coming for her was only confounded by the sense that Luke was about to do the one thing that would trap her there.  
  
Abbie had one foot out of the door when Ichabod Crane stepped in.  She was a natural profiler, a fact that had Quantico keen on enlisting her.  There wasn’t a person or situation she couldn’t suss out within a moment’s glance.  For some on the force, they had begun to trust her over their own lie detection machines.  She never went with her gut feelings on someone; she was bound to get hurt if she ever allowed herself that luxury.  But with Ichabod Crane, the man out of time, logic and her instinct aligned in an instant.  She knew him.  There was a commonality; a shared pain, a heavy loss, a burden that refused to keep them down and a fear that fueled them forward.  It was her fear that lead Abbie to continuously doubt him, even in the face of certainty.  It was his fear that refused to let her get away from him that easily, that she needed to face the tribulations ahead of them.  That she was no longer alone.  She didn’t want to believe him.  
  
Weeks went by and not a one without some supernatural death at their heels.  Crane’s presence at her side as a ‘consultant’ slowly became status quo.  He became her unofficial partner, though he would never completely fill August Corbin’s shoes.  That would’ve been an impossible feat for any officer.  Yet, she began to rely on his judgment, to care for his well-being.   Unlike the others who discovered her through her façade, Crane appeared to have never been fooled by it.  He saw her for who she was from the moment het locked eyes with her through the bars of his jail cell.  There was no change in his eyes, only a penetrating intensity that never seemed to go away.  There was no alteration in how he dealt with her, he didn’t need to.   She couldn’t escape his gaze, at times reverent, then other times as if he is peeling back another layer, looking for the parts that she doesn’t let anyone ever see.  Sometimes, she catches those eyes giving her another look, a flash of something that neither wanted to see or acknowledge, but knew very well what it was.  Moments where his eyes were not on her seemed few and far between, but every now and then some mundane appliance, completely foreign to Ichabod’s memory would divert him. His eyes would light up with an almost childlike curiosity, followed with a bemused expression as he tried to figure out the device’s purpose.    
  
He would only deign to ask her questions out of expediency or once his expansive knowledge ran out of logical explanations.  She knew now it was not merely out of pride, but as to not run out of goodwill for questions of a more ‘personal nature’.  If he wasted his cache on whimsy, she’d have the ammunition to ignore the things he truly wished to know. Regardless, his questions managed to cut down to the bone, yet she found herself answering instead of telling the man to bother someone else.  It didn’t matter how much she said, or how little, he still could piece together the full picture.  How, after leaving him behind to face her estranged sister all of these years, he knew.  
  
She found herself stuck in the driver’s seat of her Durango, fears and misplaced guilt swirling in her mind.  The Sandman only got her to face her fear and acknowledge her sins, but was she truly ready to see the hatred in Jenny’s eyes?  Her chest hurt at the memory of their last meeting, she could only imagine that it had only intensified over the years.  Just when she was about to back down, the passenger door opened and Ichabod hopped into the seat, clicking his seat belt with aplomb. “You’re my transport back to my lodging,” was his only explanation, though his expression belied that fact.  Abbie decided as she pulled out of the parking lot that she would have to lock him in when they got to the asylum, lest he decided he needed to follow her inside under some lame excuse as well. She could barely stand how much she appreciated his support.  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unbeta'd at the moment, will clean up later


	3. Jenny's Turn

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can thank this lady for upping this story's rating. She almost stole the scene enough to turn this chapter into a standalone, but for completion's sake I'm leaving it in.

As much as Jennifer Mills loved and respected August Corbin, the man was full of shit.   For years he coddled her sister, insisting with that omnipresent smile of his that it all had to be on Abbie’s time. In his words, Jenny and her sister were special, but it was her eldest sister that was in line for even greater things.  It just wasn’t fair, Abbie got everything.  
  
Even before she came to that bitter realization, she was aware of being born to an unbalanced world at a young age, where the chips were stacked against her from the moment she drew breath.  She figured it out long before their father left the picture, before the shock and grief from it broke the last vestiges of their mother’s sanity.  It came as little surprise when they were carted off to their new home, one that seemed to be even more temporary for the youngest Mills.  Jenny was destined to not have much of anything.  If she wanted a slice of anything in this life, she was going to have to fight for it.  It made her want for nothing, save for making sure that other women and children like her did not have to live with the same fate.  The fact that the world wrote her off as insane and a nuisance worked to her advantage, it was easier to turn their back and look the other way.    
  
Her sister, even with her own demons and battles to fight, seemed to manage to have the easy life. With Corbin’s help, Abbie got to keep her virtuous image intact, even though she backslid and committed enough misdeeds to make Jenny look downright angelic. It wasn’t the lies, or the crimes swept under the rug that made Jenny hate her sister, it was being sent on missions around the world while Abbie continued to live safely by Corbin’s side.  For what little the world seemed to give to the Mills sisters, it seemed to fall into Abbie’s hands. Though Corbin believed to his last dying breath that Jenny would manage to forgive Abbie, it didn’t mean that Jenny wouldn’t make Abbie suffer first.  She would have to fight for Jenny’s love, just as Jenny had to fight to protect to keep her fucking coward for a sister alive.  
  
Shunning her at the asylum was too easy, wasn’t nearly enough to express how much she resented and blamed her for every bad thing that she suffered through in her life.  Ichabod Crane’s involvement served to make her dig her heels in the ground further, and not just because the man looked and acted like he stepped off of the pages from a fucking Harlequin novel.   He was a live Masterpiece Theatre set piece and historical reenactor, why Abbie would pay half a mind to such a man caught Jenny’s curiosity instantly.  Of course, her needling was sidelined by his insistence that he help, if not for the world but for her sister.  Another man trapped in her sister’s thrall, if she had one talent that had to be it.  For that, the apocalypse could just fucking happen for all she cared.  She still had her promise to Corbin to uphold, after that, she’d be done with this town and all of the messed up shit that was bound to it.  
  
***  
  
She had been joking about Ichabod being Abbie’s boyfriend, but as she sat in the backseat of her sister’s car she had to wonder.  At the cabin, they moved with the intimacy of a pair that knew each other for years, though apparently the Vicomte de Grouchy had only awoken to this side of the century for only a few weeks.  He seemed particularly spared from Abbie’s wrath, a lesser man wouldn’t fare half as well lifting Abbie physically from her seat; in fact they wouldn’t dare.  Yet lift he did, and though Abbie did not disguise her annoyance at the gesture, she moved as she was bid.    
  
When the laser sights and gunfire was unleashed on the cabin, Jenny took note while they dove for cover, that in the battle of who got to shield and push the other from harm’s way, Abbie prevailed.  It was made all the more ridiculous given the man was twice her size, yet her sister managed just fine.  As she found an opening to flank the assailants, she caught out of the corner of her eye the silent instruction on how to chamber a fresh clip.  She had been too focused on her objective to get the jump on one of the shooters to see how that result turn out, though apparently Abbie and Ichabod’s rapid fire was convincing enough to thin the herd, so to speak.  It made the surrender of the last man standing all the more easier, for that she couldn’t find complaint.   
  
She did, however, take complete issue with Abbie’s manner of interrogation, yet as they grappled for control of the situation, there was the Boy Scout, interjecting himself where he didn’t belong.  Though he kept his eyes and body mostly turned in her sister’s direction, he made sure not to turn his back entirely to Jenny.  Smart man, albeit an unhelpful one.  He made up for it after the Hessian decided to permanently check out of the interrogation, diffusion yet another squabble with the introduction of his photographic memory.  The pride in Abbie’s voice at announcing that fact made her hate the man, if only for a moment.  
  
***  
  
Finally, she found a sore point, although it fell into her lap on accident.  As she began to reload her ammunition in the backseat of Abbie’s SUV, Ichy made a point to compliment and ask about her training.  Though she was not accustomed to boasting about her history, the earnestness in his voice was enough to get her to rattle off her successful missions.  She was a soldier that belonged to no army, but in his words she could sense a meeting a like-minded individual.  He sounded positively giddy at meeting her at a common ground, even though it was at the expense of setting a glaring difference between him and her sister.  Jenny was more than happy to make the distinction with a backhanded comment, knowing for certain his agreement would only serve to dig the knife in deeper.  Abbie’s curt dismissal of the entire conversation wounded no one but the person sitting next to her.  Jenny couldn’t even mask her victorious smile as he wisely turned back in his seat and became uncharacteristically silent.  Maybe there was a benefit of taking a Prince Valiant for herself.


	4. A Lack of Trust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> To be trusted is a greater compliment than being loved. -George MacDonald

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Minor spoilers for 1x05. Quote inspiration from Orlando Jones.

At first, when it was merely a stretch of days; Luke Morales could only accept that the primary suspect in Corbin’s murder was in fact a key witness. He argued against it, if only on the grounds that no court in the United States was going to believe anything that came out of Ichabod Crane’s mouth. Except, as he realized as the days stretched on to weeks, that Abbie clearly had little problem doubting the ‘Oxford professor’s tale.’ When the witness suddenly joined on retainer as a consultant, Luke began voicing his doubts to anyone who could listen, but everyone around him either seemed concerned with their own self-promotion or charmed by the British man’s accent and outdated charm to care that they were talking with a man who sincerely believed that he was from the 18th century.

He knew that deep down somewhere that people were beginning to question the new guy in some form; he had overheard the whispers as he passed the break room or sat at his corner at the diner. 

“Abbie trusts him,” he caught Wendy uttering as a deputy began to gossip one morning as they watched Abbie and her ‘partner’ head off to the archives across the street. The pair were too engrossed in the conversation to take note of the people around them. Crane made it to the door first, intentionally since the man tended to measure his strides to his shorter companion except when it served his purpose, and Abbie seemed to take no umbrage as he held the door for her. The Abbie that Luke knew would stop in her tracks and wave half of the male force along to make her point. Not only did she step through the door without so much a pause in her stride, the smirk on her face as she glanced back at Ichabod to resume the conversation made Luke set his jaw.

Abigail Mills, by no stretch of the imagination, trusted Ichabod Crane. Luke could rest easy if her trust only went so far as finding nothing but good intentions behind his chivalry, but he feared it went much deeper. Even though Luke had known Abbie for much longer, long enough to believe that she might have begun to love him, not once did Luke ever feel that Abbie trusted him. She doubted his sincerity, questioned his want for her, probably wouldn’t have allowed herself to be protected by him in danger. The specter of what happened long before he met her haunted the entirety of their relationship, at times her lack of trust in him and the world made him wonder if there was a part of her that was a bit crazy. Perhaps Quantico was where she needed to go, to find herself and her priorities. Maybe the absence was what she needed to realize that maybe she could have a place in her life. Yet, even after Corbin was laid to rest, Abbie rescinded her transfer. Though she chose to remain in the city, the door to Abbie’s heart was locked to him. Even if she did love him, she didn’t trust that things between them could go back to the way they were before. She wasn’t wrong. For what felt like eternity to get Abbie to relax and smile back at him, to not tense when he started to call her ‘Ab’, to admit that she loved flowers and had a weakness for cute things…all it took for the man who sincerely believed he fought in the Revolutionary War was to be suspected of her late partner’s murder. 

When Luke received news that Ichabod had been checked out of the motel, he couldn’t mask his glee when he asked what time the plane left for the UK, only to be dejected to learn that Ichabod Crane was in no rush to leave Sleepy Hollow. In fact, the pair was taking a noted off-the-clock shopping trip for things that Crane would need in his new residence. Luke felt his blood boil at the news; he knew that Abbie had a doting side. It was a calming thought to imagine her looking after a wayward child or an abandoned puppy, albeit one with a fondness for wearing period garb 24-7. It made him resent the man all the more, that someone that she was being tasked to look after, could be so easily trusted. The Abbie he knew didn’t have it in her to trust, but he loved her anyway. 

He never bothered to try to hide how much he still did love her in his voice, even as his voice tightened as her new partner waltzed past them, still dressed in his Ren-faire finery. Luke did his best to ignore the snooty glance the man shot his way as Luke tried to engage Abbie’s attention, just as he tried not to be put off by her impatience that he was taking his time getting to the point. She wasn’t one for loitering, especially over personal matters at work, but Luke reasoned emphasizing that she was stuck carting an insane man at work was a safe overlap, wasn’t it?

_“For a detective, you don’t really have a clue.”_

He was so gobsmacked by her words that her leaving completely escaped his attention. What more was there to know about that man, especially one that she had no trouble hanging off of his every word.

***

Just because the man checked out at Oxford did little to put Luke’s heart to rest, especially as he watched as Abbie hovered over Ichabod’s quarantine monitor, her eyes lined with worry. He had caught the tail end of the man’s confinement, saw his ex nearly commit bodily harm to the men in their haz-mat suits had Parsons not had managed to not only restrain her but talk sense through her panicked rage. He felt as much as he heard the mournful cry in her protest when the order was issued to sedate Crane. And now, as he watched Abbie in a place where he could no longer reach her, even if to offer comfort, Luke Morales finally got a clue.


	5. Silent Strength

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ‘He who does not understand your silence will probably not understand your words.’ -Elbert Hubbard

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spoilers for 1x05

The forest, once a respite from the uncertainty in her life, now tormented Abbie with its presence. Branches, tall and varied, shielded her and her sister, its leaves waved through a comforting breeze. Though the beers in hand were only brought in childish rebellion, but the thick roots of their chosen stomping ground existed for centuries before they set foot there. Through storms and harsh weather, they still remained. With her mind hazy from the alcohol, Abbie would stare up from the base of a gigantic oak and silently imagine that she was imbued with the same strength of the living plant she rested upon. Her faith, not as strong as her mother did her best to instill, were merely words until Jenny orchestrated these escapes into the woods. 

It was the path in the woods that brought her to her faith, but it was also in the woods that closed her to her own beliefs. The white trees, the demon, the four days that she insisted she had no memory of, did little to strike the underlying terror that she felt. She followed Ichabod down Witch Spring Trail, their task to track a colony lost over 400 years. Where his knack for being the most knowledgeable professor that Abbie had ever met could be a minor—strike that, a _major_ annoyance, Abbie was all at once grateful for this particular instruction. He seemed to revel in her interest in his methods of tracking, absent the occasional eye roll of yet another skill he was ever so modest to share. Why it was endearing was a mystery to Abbie, but the fact that the main road was closed off from them had been absent on her mind until they focused on the second set of tracks.

The unexplained nature of the footprints sent her mind reeling, refusing to acknowledge the supernatural hand that lead them to that spot, though feeling with growing panic that it was still connected to the ground they stood on. She began to speak, the authoritative pep talk more to herself than her companion. Subconsciously Abbie rooted herself against the tree against her back, her heels shifting side to side as the logical part of her mind battled with the irrational fear that was tightening around her heart. They had a task, a purpose. Let it be done and she’d never have to set foot in that place again. Ichabod, for his part, said nothing until she finished speaking. He stared at her, paying as much mind to her words as the ones she left out of the equation. After giving her a moment to gather her bearings, he waited until Abbie took a breath before speaking again. There was no sarcasm or playful banter in his response, only concern.

“Are you alright?” 

Those three words, cemented her decision, even though her nod was uneven. Yes, she would go along with him. Yes, she wasn’t alright, but she wasn’t alone. Wordlessly, Ichabod stepped forward, taking the lead to the singular trail of foot prints. She followed behind him, looking up at his stead posture, how his fingers were continuously seeking for something to touch when unclasped from behind his back. Like the oak of her youth, she glanced up at the half-tied ponytail and felt her depleted strength return with each step. A smile tug at the corner of her lips as she made the comparison, but this revelation she would keep to herself, lest he think she was beginning to depend on him.

***

Was it her faith that brought them to the well, or her desperation to find a cure? She had faced Pestilence head on, unblinking and without an ounce of fear as the horse dissolved into ash. Curing Thomas lead to its defeat, and the citizens of Sleepy Hollow were spared. As was Crane. He stood beside her now, crowing with that infuriatingly smug grin on his face as he praised her for relying on faith. This particular win, she knew came at a cost. She saw the unbridled glee as they encountered the lost colony. It was still two centuries before his time, but it was still far more familiar to Ichabod than the present century. Watching his face as the awareness that the past was irrevocably lost to him pained Abbie, even as she was filled with relief. Not knowing what words to express, to comfort Ichabod while relishing in her own selfishness for keeping him where he was, she retreated to familiarity. Though her voice started to take a commanding tone, the pleading crept beneath her words, even though she couldn’t manage to actually say them.

Abbie knew that for all of his bluster and talk, Crane was beginning to learn Abbie's personal language. 

Whatever she said, or didn’t, he understood. She needed him here, in the present. They had little to lean on but each other, she needed for that to be okay. If this road had to be traveled, she wanted to travel it. But only with him. He was simultaneously taken aback by her unspoken forwardness, then began to smile in that implicit acknowledgement of his, that he knew more than others would normally missed. He did well not to respond outright, learning that some things were best kept to himself.

“Well, what do you say we go home then?” He asked, leaving no distinction between which home he meant. By her smile, this time it was she who read Ichabod clearly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Irving was originally planned to wrap up the last chapter, but this came about instead. Thank you for reading!


End file.
